Pope Francis: In the Eucharist we receive the grace to love

 

By Hannah Brockhaus

Vatican City, Oct 29, 2017 / 07:14 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Sunday Pope Francis reflected on Jesus’ command to love God above all things, and your neighbor as yourself, saying that it is in the Eucharist that we receive the grace to carry this out.
“God, who is Love, has created us to make us part of his life, to be loved and to love Him, and to love all other people with Him. This is God's 'dream' for man. And in order to accomplish it we need his grace, we need to receive in us the ability to love that comes from God himself.”
For this reason “Jesus offers himself to us in the Eucharist...” the Pope said Oct. 29. “In it we receive his Body and His Blood, that is, we receive Jesus in the best expression of his love, when He has offered himself to the Father for our salvation.”



Pope Francis reflected on Sunday’s “short, but very important” Gospel passage from St. Matthew in his brief message before leading the Angelus with around 30,000 people in St. Peter’s Square.
In the Gospel passage, a Pharisee asks Jesus what, among the more than 600 Jewish laws, is the greatest. And Jesus, not hesitating at all, answers: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. And love your neighbor as yourself."
The Ten Commandments, which were communicated directly to Moses by God, are a covenant with the people. And in his answer, “Jesus wants to make it clear that without love of God and neighbor there is no true fidelity to this covenant with the Lord,” the Pope pointed out.
In answering this question, Jesus is trying to help the Pharisees understand the proper order and importance of things, and how all other laws depend on these two.
“What Jesus proposes on this evangelical page is a wonderful ideal that corresponds to the most authentic desire of our heart,” he said. “In fact, that we have been created to love and to be loved.”



Francis emphasized that we can do many good things, follow all the laws, but if we do not have love it is useless. This is how Jesus lived his life: preaching and performing works always with what is “essential, that is, love.”
“Love gives momentum and fecundity to life and to the journey of faith: without love, both life and faith remain sterile.”


In fact, even if we have known the commandment to love from the time we were children, we must never stop trying to conform ourselves to this law, putting it into practice in whatever situation we find ourselves in, he concluded.
And as we try to live out this commandment to love, we can turn to the Blessed Virgin Mary for help, he said: The Holy Virgin helping us “to welcome into our lives the 'great commandment' of love of God and of neighbor.”






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Taken from: https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-in-the-eucharist-we-receive-the-grace-to-love-61924

Pope Francis: Paradise is the embrace with God, infinite love

“Paradise is not a fantasy land, or even an enchanted garden,” Pope Francis said during his weekly General Audience Oct. 25. “Paradise is the embrace with God, infinite Love, and we enter it thanks to Jesus, who died on the cross for us.”

ROME - During Wednesday’s general audience on the theme of Christian hope, Pope Francis spoke about hope’s fulfillment in heaven and reminded faithful that no one should despair because God’s grace is always present for those who put their trust in him.

“Paradise is not a fantasy land, or even an enchanted garden,” the pope said Oct. 25. “Paradise is the embrace with God, infinite Love, and we enter it thanks to Jesus, who died on the cross for us.”


Francis told the roughly 25,000 people gathered in St. Peter’s square that Jesus uses the word ‘paradise’ only once in the Gospel, when he is nailed to the cross and talking to the Good Thief. The pope described the scene on mount Calvary, where Jesus had his “last appointment with a sinner, to open wide to him also the doors of his Kingdom.”
The Good Thief humbly and bravely asked Jesus, “remember me” (cf. Lk 23:42), touching Christ’s heart with his repentance. He “reminds us of our real condition before God,” Francis said, “that we are his children, that He feels compassion for us, that He is disarmed every time we manifest nostalgia for his love.”


This scene repeats itself countless times in prison cells or hospital rooms, the pope continued, “no person, no matter how badly he lived, is left with only desperation and denied grace.”


Francis said that all of us come before God empty handed, discovering near death that our sins outnumber the good deeds we have done, but we “must not lose hope,” he added, “but confide in the mercy of God” like the publican in the Temple, or the prodigal son.
“Where there’s Jesus, there’s mercy and happiness,” Francis said. “Without him there’s cold and darkness.” Even when everyone else has abandoned us, Jesus is next to us, eager to lead us to “the most beautiful place in existence,” he said.


When the soul of the sinner goes to Heaven, the good that he has done in his life will go with him so that nothing that the Lord has redeemed will go lost, the pope said. But he will also carry with him “the failings and mistakes of an entire life.
“This is our life’s destination: that everything is done, and is transformed into love,” Francis said. “If we believe this, death stops frightening us, and we can also hope to leave this world serenely, with a lot of faith.
“Those who encounter Jesus, do not fear anything anymore.”


When that meeting finally happens, we will no longer be confused and need for anything, the pope continued. “We won’t cry uselessly anymore, because everything is passed; even the prophecies, even knowledge,” he said.


“But not love, that will stay.”




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Taken from: https://cruxnow.com/vatican/2017/10/25/pope-francis-paradise-embrace-god-infinite-love/

Three ways to obtain an indulgence for the 100-year Fatima anniversary

 

By Maria Ximena Rondon

Fatima, Portugal, Dec 1, 2016 / 06:32 am (CNA/EWTN News).- For the 100th anniversary of the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima in Portugal, Pope Francis has decided to grant a plenary indulgence opportunity throughout the entire anniversary year, which began Nov. 27, 2016, and will end Nov. 26, 2017.

The Executive Secretary of the Rectory of the Fatima Shrine in Portugal, André Pereira, explained to CNA that the plenary indulgence can be obtained during the entire Jubilee Year. There are three ways of obtaining the indulgence, detailed in a statement on the shrine's website.

To obtain the plenary indulgence, the faithful must also fulfill the ordinary conditions: go to Confession and Communion, be interiorly detached from sin, and pray for the intentions of the Holy Father.



1. Make a pilgrimage to the shrine


The first way is for “the faithful to make a pilgrimage to the Fatima Shrine in Portugal and participate in a celebration or prayer dedicated to the Virgin.”
In addition, the faithful must pray the Our Father, recite the Creed, and invoke the Mother of God.


2. Pray before any statue of Our Lady of Fatima


The second way applies to “the pious faithful who visit with devotion a statue of Our Lady of Fatima solemnly exposed for public veneration in any church, oratory or proper place during the days of the anniversary of the apparitions, the 13th of each month from May to October (2017), and there devoutly participate in some celebration or prayer in honor of the Virgin Mary.”
Regarding this second way, the rector of the Fatima Shrine told CNA that the visit to the statue of the Virgin, “does not necessarily have to be only at Fatima or exclusively in Portugal,” but can be done anywhere in the world.
Those seeking an indulgence must also pray an Our Father, recite the Creed and invoke Our Lady of Fatima.





3. The elderly and infirm


The third way to obtain a plenary indulgence applies to people who, because of age, illness or other serious cause, are unable to get around.
These individuals can pray in front of a statue of Our Lady of Fatima and must spiritually unite themselves to the jubilee celebrations on the days of the apparitions, the 13th of each month, between May and October 2017.
They also must “offer to merciful God with confidence, through Mary, their prayers and sufferings or the sacrifices they make in their own lives.”


Editor's note: The original version of this article incorrectly identified André Pereira as the rector of the Fatima shrine.


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Taken from: https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/three-ways-to-obtain-an-indulgence-for-the-100-year-fatima-anniversary-78258